Hi Parishrut,

The Factory Preset piano "Full Concert Grand" is a meticulously sampled, eq'd and programmed instrument Voice. When you seek to change anything about it in terms of EQ or filters you are doing so based on the music you are surrounding it with and/or are compensating for the environment and sound system through which you are playing it.

This can vary greatly. However, let's start by stating the "Full Concert Grand" as a preset starts out as balanced as the experts at Yamaha could make it... and under good playback circumstances it plays extremely well. Now, as soon as you add other instruments that will compete with the some range of the piano's frequencies... this is when you feel the need to adjust the EQ of an instrument.... if an acoustic guitar is mixed in with the piano they compete throughout the low-mid and mid range. You can feel that because the guitar is playing a certain way, it may interfere with or block some of the piano sound, so you seek to EQ it to overcome this competition.

This is why no one can really tell you what settings to make... each guitar is different, each guitar Part is different, each piece of music is different, if the guitar played different chord voicings versus what the piano s playing, then what disturbed you about the sound may not even occur. The point I'm trying to make is... fixing a problem with EQ, or with a Filter, is always going to be based on the surrounding program... and what is happening at the time. Always.

The piano outputs frequencies directly, from 27.5Hz through 4,186.01Hz (with harmonic extending up through the entire range of hearing).

I've found in my years teaching audio engineering, that the best way for musicians to learn to use Equalizers, is to make them aware of the relationship between the frequencies involved in the notes they are playing and relating them directly to the numbers on the EQ device and/or Filter they are using.

An EQ is a device that combines amplifiers with filters... and learning to use them well, is usually easier for musicians than it is for non-musicians, once the musician puts their knowledge of Frequency to use. If you are still guessing what frequency to boost on your EQ to make the bass sound sweeter in a particular song... stop. Think.

If you know what Key the Song is in, then you know what the root Note for the bass player is. This should not be a guessing game, you can know exactly what frequency resonates for that song...

Once you know to analyze what you are listening to, you'll never guess at an EQ frequency again. Your whole approach to EQ'ing starts to change. When working with a "third of an octave Equalizer", the non-musician is baffled by the phrase, the musician should be thinking "that's every major third"

The second big lesson is to remember an EQ combines an Amp (boosts) and a Filter (cuts) - learn to also work by taking away. Some times it's a better strategy. Instead of listening and saying "what am I not getting enough of", which leads to boosting all the time; listen and say, "what am I getting too much of, what can I remove to make this better"... learn that removing cloudy frequencies can result in clearer sound, as effectively, if not better than boosting.

Just some things to think about.
Hope that helps.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iylREvwPEzI
I want my piano to sound this good. This is also FULL CONCERT GRAND.

Bad Mister wrote:

Hi Parishrut,

The Factory Preset piano "Full Concert Grand" is a meticulously sampled, eq'd and programmed instrument Voice. When you seek to change anything about it in terms of EQ or filters you are doing so based on the music you are surrounding it with and/or are compensating for the environment and sound system through which you are playing it.

This can vary greatly. However, let's start by stating the "Full Concert Grand" as a preset starts out as balanced as the experts at Yamaha could make it... and under good playback circumstances it plays extremely well. Now, as soon as you add other instruments that will compete with the some range of the piano's frequencies... this is when you feel the need to adjust the EQ of an instrument.... if an acoustic guitar is mixed in with the piano they compete throughout the low-mid and mid range. You can feel that because the guitar is playing a certain way, it may interfere with or block some of the piano sound, so you seek to EQ it to overcome this competition.

This is why no one can really tell you what settings to make... each guitar is different, each guitar Part is different, each piece of music is different, if the guitar played different chord voicings versus what the piano s playing, then what disturbed you about the sound may not even occur. The point I'm trying to make is... fixing a problem with EQ, or with a Filter, is always going to be based on the surrounding program... and what is happening at the time. Always.

The piano outputs frequencies directly, from 27.5Hz through 4,186.01Hz (with harmonic extending up through the entire range of hearing).

I've found in my years teaching audio engineering, that the best way for musicians to learn to use Equalizers, is to make them aware of the relationship between the frequencies involved in the notes they are playing and relating them directly to the numbers on the EQ device and/or Filter they are using.

An EQ is a device that combines amplifiers with filters... and learning to use them well, is usually easier for musicians than it is for non-musicians, once the musician puts their knowledge of Frequency to use. If you are still guessing what frequency to boost on your EQ to make the bass sound sweeter in a particular song... stop. Think.

If you know what Key the Song is in, then you know what the root Note for the bass player is. This should not be a guessing game, you can know exactly what frequency resonates for that song...

Once you know to analyze what you are listening to, you'll never guess at an EQ frequency again. Your whole approach to EQ'ing starts to change. When working with a "third of an octave Equalizer", the non-musician is baffled by the phrase, the musician should be thinking "that's every major third"

The second big lesson is to remember an EQ combines an Amp (boosts) and a Filter (cuts) - learn to also work by taking away. Some times it's a better strategy. Instead of listening and saying "what am I not getting enough of", which leads to boosting all the time; listen and say, "what am I getting too much of, what can I remove to make this better"... learn that removing cloudy frequencies can result in clearer sound, as effectively, if not better than boosting.

Just some things to think about.
Hope that helps.

Another huge tip for playing a piano on a MIDI instrument:

Become aware of what the Velocity Range means, 1-127. That is a limit that many a piano player does not fully appreciate when approaching playing a MIDI controlled sound. Maximum velocity is 127. Hitting the keyboard harder than the effort it takes to register 127 is meaningless and means you are not getting a realistic dynamic performing range with your MIDI data.

I always ask, "how hard can you hit a piano?" It's a serious question. I know, for me, it was probably a quadruple forte, ffff moment in a Rachmaninoff piece.. . but that's 127... it's as loud as you're ever going to get.

The point being:
If you can reach 127 too easily, you might want to adjust how your instrument is set as to velocity curve. Remember 127 should be resevered for the very loudest/hardest you're going to play, period. The maximum Accent allowable in MIDI is 127. If all you downbeats are 127 you cannot create an accent.

One of the programmable things (of great importance) is the overall Velocity Curve (and then the velocity response within the Voice itself - to really make a sound your own, you can adjust each Voice's response to your playing style. It is deeper programming but it is available if you are into exploring it.

Record yourself playing - then study the data. Are your velocities generally low, or high?
If your speakers or headphones are up too loud when you are playing, you will adjust by playing with a lighter touch. If your signal is too low you will start to play more aggressively. This can cause your MIDI data to be too hot (too many high velocities) or too low (not enough dynamics).

As musicians we don't naturally think about the 'loudest' we are going to play... but recording requires we consider this, whether we are recording MIDI data or Audio signal. There are now boundaries that must be considered.

A good rule of thumb is set the sound system so that it feels like you are playing an acoustic piano in a room... or just slightly louder. Make sure it "feels good" to play! Try out the different global velocity curves. The default is "normal" but that's just because it's in the middle between "hard" and "soft". Try each for several minutes (important). Of course, as soon as you change you'll notice it's different. But it takes five or ten minutes playing with it before you can truly rule it in or out.

Once you investigate what your MIDI looks like, you'll perhaps discover that you were missing some of the expressiveness of the instrument because you were not paying attention to the velocity data you are generating when you play. It can be eye opening.

Parishrut wrote:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iylREvwPEzI
I want my piano to sound this good. This is also FULL CONCERT GRAND.

If you notice, the YouTube video says:

Using the full concert grand and reverb on the Motif XF workstation.

I ran into the same problem. Setting the velocity curve to Soft worked for me.